The Spark
by Orphan Girl
Summary: ...she thought that even if they made it safely to the real world and some day found themselves saying vows to one another in front of a minister, she could not feel more married to him than she did at that moment." One-shot, Sawyer/Juliet.


**Just a glimpse into Juliet's head in her last couple of scenes with Sawyer in 5x15, "Follow the Leader." I have a bad feeling about what the finale will bring around for these two, but here's hoping that I'm wrong!  
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They were marched down the dock at gunpoint, hands cuffed in front of them, arms touching. She thought about the countless times they'd walked this dock together in the past few years … first in companionable silence, sitting down at the end of it to look at the stars and simply talk; and later, hand in hand, lying entwined on a blanket and listening to the waves and just being. It was a hell of a way to leave the dock for the last time, yet somehow strangely fitting. Absurdity had become the standard in her life since the moment she'd first set a foot on these very planks.

Nothing was right. They were leaving their friends behind to fend for themselves. They were handcuffed and bloody. They hadn't been allowed to pack a single thing. The people they'd spent the past three years building trust with thought they were traitors or worse. And most wrong of all, the cruelest joke: she was finally leaving the island, finally returning to the world that she'd left behind so long ago, but it wasn't the right world. It was three decades before her time, an immovable barrier separating her from her sister. Of course. She had finally come to understand that nothing would ever happen in the way she'd hoped, that something would always, inevitably, ruin it. Her life with James had lulled her into thinking she could have one unspoiled, perfect thing on the island, but when Jack and Kate and Hugo had shown up, she chastised herself for being so foolish. So forgetful. Of course it couldn't last. Some malevolent force out there was determined to never allow her a lasting happiness, and now with this final disruption had finally succeeding in remaking her as a fatalist. What was the line from that Frost poem she'd had to memorize in high school? Nothing gold can stay. Not in Juliet Burke's life, especially. It was a lesson she had to keep relearning, and bitterly.

James apologized for not listening to her when she had wanted to leave on the sub three years ago, and she knew then that she had not done a good enough job of spelling out just exactly how much he meant to her. He can't know, if he's saying she would have been better off leaving. They aren't alone, so she says only that she's glad he talked her out of it, and he looks pleased. She adds, "_I love you, you are the best thing that ever happened to me,_" with her eyes, and she thinks he gets the message. She would have kissed him under any other circumstances, but there are men with guns and mortal peril barreling down at them, so she doesn't. When the men say it's time to go, she immediately regrets not having kissed him anyway.

After stepping foot into the sub--the moment she'd dreamed about so many nights since she'd arrived--she did not even give the island a second glance. It had been her home for over six years, so she thought she should probably feel something towards it now, in spite of everything--a moment's worth of nostalgia, maybe--but the only thing she felt was a rush of gratitude as looked up at James' face. There had only been one good thing to come out of these six years, just one, and he was there with her. She kept her eyes on him as she stepped down into the submarine, and the terrible beauty of the mountains behind him stayed as a backdrop, out of focus.

She knew what it meant, that he had offered to give Stuart what he wanted in exchange for a place on the sub. He was choosing her, in the most final of ways. They were a unit, a family, and he was placing the survival of that family above all else. It was a decision she never would have asked him to make, but he had done it, and for the first time in her life she knew what it was like to be someone's top priority. She felt like her heart might swell out of her chest for him, this man who kept surprising her over and over. Her string of bad choices with men had finally ended with him, the most unlikely of all-- a con man, a killer--labels others would give him but she never would, because those words were not who he was. They were things he had done. And now he was quite literally forsaking all others for her, and she thought that even if they made it safely to the real world and some day found themselves saying vows to one another in front of a minister, she could not feel more married to him than she did right at that moment.

They were handcuffed to tables and he was talking about freedom. He was talking about plans for living in the real world, far away from this place. He clutched her hand tightly, told her he had her back no matter what happened, gave her that grin of his when he told her he loved her. She couldn't help but smile back at him. His optimism was infectious, just like it had always been, and a sudden vision of a house with a garden and a swingset and a whole room full of books flashed through her mind, quickly interrupted by one of the guard's voices.

"Don't close the hatch! Horace wants her off the island too."

She knew immediately who the 'her' had to be, because of course it was Kate, of course it was, and she felt the tiny flame of hope she'd let James kindle in her in spite of her better judgment go out in an instant. There were no happy endings in this place, not for her. His gaze flitted over to Kate, and she saw him realize his plans were going to fall apart just minutes after he'd conceived of them. She closed her eyes for a second, steeling herself for whatever it was that would come bearing down on them soon enough, and when she opened them again he was staring at her intently. He didn't even attempt to include Kate in his words, clearly intending them for her alone. "We're going to be OK," he said, and she nodded, smiling just a little to encourage him to believe what he was saying, because as long as he had a little bit of hope, maybe it was all right that she had none of her own. He cocked his head a little, squinted at her. He knew her well enough by now to know what her smile had meant. "Microsoft," he whispered fervently, flashing his dimples at her, and she couldn't help it, she had to laugh. He would make an optimist out of her yet. He reached for her hand again and squeezed it, just sitting silently for a long moment before asking Kate how the hell she'd ended up there. Juliet closed her eyes again and felt a tiny spark inside of her ignite.


End file.
